An automotive body construction includes an underbody and a wheelhouse at which a reinforcement bracket is typically positioned on top of the floor of the underbody to increase torsional rigidity. This known reinforcement structure for the wheelhouse not located strategically well and does not provide an effective connection into the existing back-up structure in the underbody, which leads to over cost, over weight and ineffective reinforcement design solutions for increasing torsional rigidity.
An example of a known wheelhouse reinforcement structure can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 7,021,703, issued to Toshiyuki Yamaguchi, et al, on Apr. 4, 2006. This prior art patent discloses left and right floor rear side rails extending in a longitudinal direction (i.e. front to rear with respect to the automotive vehicle) and a rear suspension cross member connected between the left and right floor rear side rails. The underbody floor is mounted on the rear side rails and the underbody cross members. Left and right damper support members are mounted to the underbody floor adjacent to the respective floor rear side rails for supporting upper end portions of the damper support member in a transverse direction, and mounted to the underbody floor and the corresponding floor rear side rails for covering upper parts of the left and right rear wheels. Left and right gussets are connected to a reinforcement plate, a respective wheelhouse, a respective damper support member and underbody cross member.
In U.S. Pat. No. 6,648,401, issued to Guenter Behnke and Thomas Doerfler and assigned to Ford Global Technologies, LLC, on Nov. 18, 2003, a reinforcement member is disclosed as being fastened to a longitudinal member in a region of a junction between the longitudinal member and underbody cross member. This reinforcement member results in a particularly rigid connecting node formed by the underbody cross member, the longitudinal rear side rail members and the wheelhouse. The reinforcement member provides an additional path to transfer forces from the wheelhouse into the longitudinal rear side rail member.
It would be desirable to provide a reinforcement bracket located inside the rear side rail in alignment with the shock and the underbody cross member to create superior structural continuity in the rear underbody architecture.